I initially thought that I could put down those few names that appeal to me more than average, but then I realized that my association was affected by knowing people who have such names. There's also what Prowler notes when the variant of a name is more appealing in one language compared to another.

The only name that is most likely to appeal to me even without knowing the other person is "Ilona".

Several Finnish names appeal to me, but I'm not sure if it's because of something intrinsic (i.e. the way they're expressed in Finnish or their meaning in Finnish) or because of the people whom I know bearing such names.

That said, I usually respond positively on hearing the following names (again helped by knowing people with such names) in addition to the aforementioned "Ilona".

Variants of some of these names however don't appeal to me as much (e.g. "Marcia" or "Martha" doesn't come off as well as Márta / Marta. The same can be said of "Susan" or "Susanne" compared to Sanna and Zuzana.)

I should add that I like very much certain nicknames or diminutives, especially those formed by letting the name end in -ek / -(k)a / -(k)o or as a palatalized or quasi-palatalized sound.

Almachtigheid wrote:How do you guys all know so many names? I have never thought of what names I like the most.If there's any name I really like it would be Matthijs, which is my brother's name. In can also be spelled like Mathijs, and I have also seen Matijs once. (It's a Dutch name, and google translate pronounces it quite properly) Also, the names Florine (FLO-REEH-NEH) or Jasmijn (Dutch name, google translate will do here as well for the pronounciation) for girls are quite nice.

And of all of the names above I also think Rivka is a very nice name (Probably the best one I have ever heard!)

I've read those books that parents use when they don't know a name for their children for fun and each year I study those lists with the names that are given to babies that year, that explains something I quite like the name Jasmijn as well, but I've known a stupid one so I'd never give my child that name. But I really like names with 'ij', I think Matthijs is nice too. Florine sounds a bit too... flowery for me (but obviously the same could be said about Jasmijn...)

@Prowler: could you give me examples of Dutch names you like? I'm curious!

It's perhaps a little pathetic to do it in advance, but I think my boyfriend and I have managed to agree upon a name if we have a girl (I'm not preggo). Unfortunately, the spelling will require a tough choice.

Varislintu wrote:And let's just avoid the whole last name issue. Finnish law only allows one last name, so it'll be either or. And all consecutive children must have the same one.

I have thought on the name of my hypothetical children that I supposedly don't want and as we can have two surname I would put the least common first and the most common afterwards. It's a pity that we can't use our second surname too.

Lur wrote:But Franziska would ultimately come from the name of the Franks and isn't Amelia a Germanic root?

Amelia is kind of odd. Supposedly it does derive from Germanic amal, but AFAIK there are no native Germanic names of the form root + -ia.

It's hard to think of Franziska as a "Germanic name" when it's only the Germanised spelling of a Latinised form of a Germanic word. (The normal German development is Fränkische, which is never used as a personal name.) But I'll grant you that one.

Lur wrote:Hans isn't Germanic? I didn't know that.

It's a shortening of Johannes, which of course ultimately represents Hebrew יוֹחָנָן.

"Richmond is a real scholar; Owen just learns languages because he can't bear not to know what other people are saying."--Margaret Lattimore on her two sons

Why do you say that? I'd seriously like to know, I'm not looking for an argument.I had noticed that some of their meanings of names differ from the meanings given in a book I have, but the book's explanations don't always make a whole lot of sense; so far, Behind the Name's meanings have made more sense (not that this proves that it's a reliable source, of course, but their explanations are fairly logical for the most part).

Also, there doesn't seem to be anything impossible about their etymology of the name "Amelia".

Shiba wrote:Why do you say that? I'd seriously like to know, I'm not looking for an argument.

They don't give any citations, so there's no telling where they're getting their information from. I've been interested in name etymologies for ages, I've read a lot of scholarly works on the subject, and I've seen a lot of inaccuracies in BTN's etymologies. With a little work, I could find some concrete examples.

Shiba wrote:Also, there doesn't seem to be anything impossible about their etymology of the name "Amelia".

That's not saying much, is it? It's not impossible that I could be a native-speaker of Hmong. But as it happens I'm not, and if I claimed I was, it would be reasonable for you to ask to see proof.

"Richmond is a real scholar; Owen just learns languages because he can't bear not to know what other people are saying."--Margaret Lattimore on her two sons

linguoboy wrote:It's hard to think of Franziska as a "Germanic name" when it's only the Germanised spelling of a Latinised form of a Germanic word. (The normal German development is Fränkische, which is never used as a personal name.) But I'll grant you that one.

And Franka isn't at all related to that? Or is that a shortening of Franziska?

linguoboy wrote:It's hard to think of Franziska as a "Germanic name" when it's only the Germanised spelling of a Latinised form of a Germanic word. (The normal German development is Fränkische, which is never used as a personal name.) But I'll grant you that one.

And Franka isn't at all related to that? Or is that a shortening of Franziska?

Franka is the female form of Frank, which comes from the Franks, but they developed differently. There's quite something about it in the German Wikipedia, but from that it's not clear where Frank came from again since they mention that franko, which is the root of both, was forgotten at first.